“I am—” Tom cleared his throat. “I must beg your pardon, Miss Somerville.”
I looked at him. He sat rigid against the far wall of the cab. “N-no,” I said.
“I should not—I ought to have greater mastery of myself.” Tom’s voice was laced with real self-disgust.
“P-please, Tom. I do n-not—”
He took the watch from inside my stolen glove and tossed the glove into my lap. Through clenched teeth he said, “I will understand if you report my impropriety to Dr. Dewhurst. Or I will tell him myself, if you wish it. I will accept the consequences.”
“No. N-no, n-n-no—Thomas Rampling, that is quite enough! We shall part here as allies and conspirators, or we shan’t part at all.” Was that my aunt Emmaline’s voice or someone else’s Mimic had found? I was too desperate to bother trying to identify it. I leaned over, took hold of Tom’s shirt with both hands, and shook him. “I have seen too much today, learned too many awful things, to let you go now and think we might not be friends. I couldn’t bear it.”
“Milady—”
I interrupted him: “It isn’t only—it is that it might be dangerous, if anyone should know.” Tom shook his head as if to disavow cowardice, but I rushed on: “Not only dangerous for you, but for me, too. I believe Lord Rosbury is capable of real violence if he should know.”
Tom stilled, looking stricken. “Of course,” he said, nodding. “Of course you are right.”
“C-call me Leonora.” Mimic had done her bit, apparently, and had gone on her way. “S-so I know we are friends. P-please, Tom.”
“Leonora.”
“Leo,” I amended.
“Leo.” Tom smiled in spite of himself.
I climbed out of the cab and paid the driver. Tom followed me out, and then we hesitated there together on the street. “Be c-careful,” I told him shakily.
“You too, Miss Luck.”
Neither of us wanted to be the first to turn away. But I might be seen, and my disguise might not hold, so it was I who shook free at last. I walked the short distance home without feeling the ground under my feet, without feeling anything at all but the memory of Tom’s soft breath on my skin and his warm lips over mine.
SEVENTEEN
In the cab Tom had told me he’d learned that the Black Glove’s next move was planned for Thursday, the second of May. That was only five days hence. Mr. Thornfax had not revealed where the explosive would be set, but his mention to Watts of a station master made us suppose it would be a train derailment. Twice that week Mr. Thornfax called on me, and both times I pleaded illness, exaggerating the symptoms of the minor cold I’d picked up at the Docks so that Christa and the servants would believe me. I couldn’t stand the thought of seeing him. I couldn’t even stand the flowers he sent. I told Bess they made my sniffles worse so that she would take them away from my room.
I looked for Tom every day, but I didn’t dare to seek him out for fear of arousing suspicions and disturbing him in his work on the timing device. I found plenty of excuses to be outside in hopes of seeing him. I played at marbles with Bertie on the drive, ignoring Mrs. Nussey’s comments about dust on my skirts. I cajoled Christabel into coming out with me for walks, hoping the fresh air would counteract her druggish state but not wholly minding it when she simply lolled on the bench nearest the gates, as this allowed me to keep a covert lookout for Tom. I even resorted to carrying the tea to my brother-in-law in his consulting rooms, though I could scarcely look Daniel in the face after what I’d learned of his ambitions. Of Daisy, also, there was no sign.
When the first of May had come and gone without a word I felt myself becoming frantic. The constant, anxious anticipation left me with a headache and a sour stomach, but going to bed early did not help me sleep.
In desperation I got up again, gathered paper and pen, and composed a letter to the Lady Hastings. I gave her every particular of the past week’s events, taking care to separate my suspicions and fears from the facts I had managed to discover. Setting the case to paper should have calmed me. Instead it exposed a stark truth: I had no proof. I could argue as elegantly as I wanted for a conspiracy of violence between Daniel and Mr. Thornfax, but without proof it amounted to the hysterical ramblings of a deranged young girl. Mad Miss Mimic, as ever.
Still, the next morning I braved the sheeting rain to meet the post-chaise at the gate. Beadall trudged beside me in his greatcoat and overshoes, casting me sidelong glances of ill-concealed irritation. I knew he liked to light his pipe as he waited for the driver and that he couldn’t feel free to do so in my presence. I knew that holding the umbrella for me was uncomfortable with the household packages crammed under his other arm. I knew, too, that he was hurt by my apparent lack of trust in his competency: he’d seen my letter to Aunt Emma in my lap as I struggled with the boot-hook and said, “No need to go out in the muck, Miss Somerville, especially if you’re feeling poorly. I’m happy to add that one to the stack.”
The letter had spent the night beneath my pillow. In the long, wakeful hours and the frightful dreams between those hours, it had become a poisoned dagger aimed at those who loved me. The accusations contained within, true or not, seemed so hateful that I’d cringed guiltily through breakfast and could not meet the Dewhursts’ eyes. I trusted Beadall of course, but my anxiety was such that I could no sooner have put the letter into the butler’s hand than march into my brother-in-law’s study and read it aloud to him.
Past the gate the rain lashed the road into a river of mud. A blurred movement across the intersection drew my attention; squinting through the torrent I could just make out a small figure hunched beneath a tree in Portman Square. The post-chaise arrived, and as Beadall handed up the packages I felt a tugging on my skirt. A boy with chapped cheeks and filthy, dripping hair held out a note addressed to me. I took it, and he dashed away again before I could find a coin for him in my purse.
I gave the coin instead to the postman, along with the letter to Aunt Emma. Then, risking further rudeness, I had Beadall wait there with the umbrella while I opened the boy’s note.
From Tom Rampling, two short sentences: Daisy brings with her my work. It will go well today.
With pounding pulse I tore the paper into bits and stuffed it into my pocket. Walking back to the house I wove and stumbled over the stones until Beadall took my arm under his. Inside I thanked him, mumbled something about a headache, and groped my way to my bedroom, where relief and fear worked together to dispatch me into the deepest sleep I’d achieved in many days.
I woke in the early afternoon. Bess had brought my lunch on a tray, and I satisfied her as to my health when I got up and ate everything on the plate. She brought me another bouquet from Mr. Thornfax, saying, “Look, Miss Somerville, just the loveliest note!”—and the poor girl seemed a bit crestfallen when I cut her off before she could read it to me. I told her I needed fresh air and should like to take a walk at once, alone, before the rain began again.
This time Mrs. Fayerweather’s hat took me to Fleet Street and the offices of The London Examiner. If the past few days had taught me anything, it was that acting must be infinitely better than waiting. And if there was any news, no one would hear it sooner than my cousin Archie Mavety. I stepped down almost jauntily from the omnibus, shooing away the alms-beggars and bootblacks with ringing reproaches. It was becoming easier and easier to play the old woman. Mimic had begun blending Mrs. Fayerweather’s with other remembered elderly voices. The cobbles shone in the weak sun and, except for the sooty creeks sluicing down the gutters carrying leaves and bits of trash, the city looked scrubbed and innocent as a child after bath time.
When I asked for him at the desk I was informed that Mr. Mavety was “out netting a whale of a story.” So I found a tea shop much like the one at the Docks and took up my vigil by the window. It was not long before Archie climbed out of a cab, and I hurried to intercept him.
“What on earth are you doing behind that veil?” he asked, laughing, when I said hello.
<
br /> It was the first time I’d seen my cousin since discovering the truth about Mr. Thornfax. Looking at his dear, freckled face I felt ashamed for suspecting him of fabricating the Black Glove stories. His instincts had been right in questioning Daniel about his medical patients and in thinking Mr. Thornfax too reckless and dangerous for me. In fact Archie had no idea just how right he was.
“I’ve borrowed the costume,” Mimic answered him, still as Mrs. Fayerweather. “But let’s not linger over that today. I am curious about the news you’ve been off to gather, Cousin.”
“Well, your timing couldn’t be better. They’ve bombed a rail train this time!”
My breath escaped in a rush.
Archie was climbing the stairs. I clutched up my skirts to keep pace with him. “Four people killed,” he said. “Awful shame.”
Four people? Nausea rose in my gut. Four lives snuffed out. And yet, the number was far lower than it might have been.
Archie confirmed this: “The train had just unloaded its passengers at Charing Cross. Fifteen minutes earlier and it would have been a right bloodbath. I’m certain it was a cock-up on the part of the Black Glove.” He chuckled. “Gangster heads will roll tonight!”
My cousin’s face was flushed, his hair was badly mussed, his coat was torn at the hem, and his neck was smeared with soot. All in all I’d never seen him so happy. He shoved open the door and had nearly rushed through it before he remembered to hold it for me.
“However can you confirm the Black Glove’s involvement? Surely you can’t print such a supposition without proof.”
Archie sniggered and shook his head at my old-lady voice. “Oh, my Lady Leo. Oh ye of little faith.” He nodded a hasty greeting to the desk boy and led me through a corridor to the copy room. Slamming his satchel to the floor and shooing another boy from his chair, he found a clean leaf of paper, whipped out a pencil, and began, with great speed and confidence, to write.
As the page filled with his untidy scrawl Archie informed me that he’d seen, with his own eyes, the note claiming responsibility for the blast. “Can you believe the Black Glove actually uses custom-designed stationery? An elegant black border and the outline of a miniature black glove at the letterhead! Even I thought it a touch overdramatic.”
The station master, upon receiving the letter, had sent word to The Examiner even before calling for the police or the fire brigade. Archie viewed this as a triumph of the free press: “It’s the public being terrorized by these gangs, so it’s sensible to inform the public as soon as possible.” He squinted up at my face to gauge my expression. “All right, I confess it also makes me feel terribly important! Old Mr. Gage asked for me personally. He’d read all my columns and told me he thought ‘’twas Mavety best equipped to ’andle the evidence, and make sommat sense of it,’ as he put it.
“’Course, the police saw me about to copy the Black Glove’s letter into my notebook and damn near tore the thing in their haste to take custody of it. Ruffians and thugs, all of them—” Archie gave a loud whistle, dropped his pencil, and, with a flourish, handed the leaf of paper to an old man who’d scurried to his side. “But it doesn’t matter. There’s enough in this story already to goggle the eyes of every Londoner with a penny to spend!”
I tweaked my cousin’s sleeve. “Who were the unfortunate souls murdered in this blast? Won’t you want to identify them in your report, or was there too much disfigurement for that?”
“No disfigurement at all. The exploded carriage was entirely empty, apparently. ’Tis a mystery how the charge was set without killing at least the bomb courier. The derailment overturned two cars, though, and the engine room caught fire. Two coal stokers, one porter”—Archie ticked the victims off on his fingers—“and a retired clerk with a ticket to Brighton. Remarkable how low the toll is, really.”
So Daisy had survived! Tom’s timer had done its work. Relief mingled with my lingering sickness over the deaths. I watched as the old man bent over Archie’s copy and his stained fingers began to move like a piano player’s over the wooden type boxes. With a rhythmic click of lead against lead he scooped the letters into his composing stick and stacked them into neat rows in the galley-frame. Bloodied kerchief, I read in the mirror-image script, and laid in the mortuary to await inquest. The tray was snatched away for proofing before I could decipher any more.
Here at least was a group of people who knew what to do with a violent catastrophe. How I envied my cousin! His freedom to visit the scene of disaster and to leave again with greater resolve and energy than before. His ability to harness chaos and fear, to channel them into the order of words and sentences.
“Sixteen thousand copies an hour!” Archie boasted. “I’d offer you a tour of the pressroom, but my story’s already late, and I’m loath to show my face down there. In fact”—he threw an arm about my shoulders and steered me toward the door—“I think it wiser to see you home before you’re entirely lost in the fray. ’Twill be dinnertime shortly, and I’m well aware how Mrs. Nussey hates asking your cook to reheat a potato.”
The great clock was indeed striking the supper hour as I entered Hastings House. Daniel met me at the door with a black glare at Archie, who waved back at him from the cab. My brother-in-law motioned me into his study. He wore his dinner jacket, but his cuffs and tie were unfastened. Perhaps he simply wants help with them, I thought wildly. I bundled Mrs. Fayerweather’s hat inside my coat and laid it on the console; I knew Beadall would probably find it and wonder, but I hoped he would simply hang it back where I’d found it.
It seemed, however, that Beadall had appointed himself my conscience and reported my doings of this morning to the doctor.
“I told you that you weren’t to see that bloody-minded newsman again,” Daniel thundered. But then, without preamble: “From whom did you receive a note this morning?”
I flushed. My mind whirled with a thousand poor excuses.
The black silk of his tie swung from Daniel’s fingers and twined through them. “Bess says you’ve been coming and going constantly this week.”
In all the years of Mimic’s interference, for all the times she’d stolen another person’s words and made them her own, she’d never deliberately invented a mistruth. And now, when I would have welcomed any outburst as a blessed distraction, she abandoned me completely.
I jumped as Daniel slammed a palm onto his desk. “Leonora. I will be satisfied in this!”
I took a breath. “The L-Lord Rosbury,” I said.
“What?”
His surprise emboldened me. “He l-likes to write to me. I was em-b-barrassed, should anyone r-read it.”
My brother-in-law swallowed, hesitating. “Have you been meeting with him? Unchaperoned?”
I shook my head. Then, seeing the intense relief on his face, I reconsidered. “But he has asked m-me to m-meet him.”
“When?”
I blushed again, this time with the audacity of the lie I was weaving. “Well, t-today. But he did n-not come as p-promised.”
Daniel bit his lip. Mr. Thornfax would have been at the rail station today, I imagined, or nearby at least, overseeing the attack. But it wouldn’t be beyond him, would it, to organize a tryst with me as an alibi, even if it cost me my reputation. I prayed Daniel would not take it upon himself to ask Mr. Thornfax about it outright.
“I asked my c-cousin to fetch me home,” I pressed. Painting Archie as the hero of my virtue was easy compared to accusing Mr. Thornfax of attempted seduction. I watched my brother-in-law’s troubled face, wondering whether he was concerned for me or purely for the Somerville name.
He turned away from me and stepped to the window. I heard him mutter, “What does he think he—? He would have every one of us at his whim.”
“P-pardon?”
Daniel had made a loop of the necktie and was stroking it as if for comfort. He cleared his throat. “I said, he should not involve you in an intrigue.”
That was not exactly what he had said, but I thought it bes
t to leave the matter there, and my brother-in-law did not chide me further about my conduct. “Make haste now,” was all he said, and waved me upstairs to dress for dinner.
That evening, hours after Christa had retired to bed, I heard Mr. Thornfax’s voice in the hall and crept to the stairs to listen.
“Should we not be celebrating? A human life has been spared, after all.” Daniel’s voice was low, placating.
“Loose ends are no cause for celebration!” Mr. Thornfax hissed back at him. “That girl can give every detail, every particular. She knew your face already, and Watts’s. And now that Curtis has brought her to me, she knows mine as well.”
“Come now, Thornfax. I hardly think the word of a wastrel fille de joie will stand against yours in a court of law.”
“What do you call it? An ‘over-dosage,’ isn’t it?”
There was a shocked silence. Then Daniel whispered, “Daisy is no threat to us. She’ll come back to me freely, by noon tomorrow at the outside, in need of another treatment.”
“She is not free. She will not be freed, and I wouldn’t trust you to take care of her in any case.”
I recognized the flinty edge in Mr. Thornfax’s voice from the warehouse, and a chill swept through me. Part of me had wanted to deny what I’d heard and seen in the laboratory, despite everything Tom had told me. I still couldn’t really reconcile Mr. Thornfax’s easy, open manners with his scheming, or the blue-eyed, golden-haired goodness of his looks with the evidence of an evil heart. Part of me still wanted to pretend I’d imagined it all.
“Someone modified that explosive to delay its ignition,” he was saying to Daniel.
“Modified? Surely you don’t think—”
Mad Miss Mimic Page 14
